Mar 18, 1999: (5) #14 Sacramento St (28-5, 14-2) vs (4) #16 Memphis (22-12, 11-5)
Injury
- PG Matt Brewer (sprained toe, 75%, 10 days)
Scouting Report- Primary defense: M2M
- Offense focus: Balanced (slow)
- Key players:
- Sr PF John Ballard (12.3 ppg, 7.7 rpg, #14 class rank)
- Strengths:
- Defense: 54.5 opp ppg (#4), 38.4% opp FG (#13), 4.4 bpg (#15)
- Control of the pace: 65.1 tempo (#7 slowest)
- Weaknesses:
- Scoring: 59.9 ppg (#329), 43.4% FG (#184), 32.4% 3PT (#250)
- How they got here:
- Finished 5th Conference B; Lost Conference Tournament Finals
- (Round 1) Def Virginia 66-51 (Ballard 22 pts, 8 rebs; VA 38% FG)
Strategies- The absence of Brewer is huge, not just his scoring (13.4 ppg), but his passing (#4 nation in assists) will be severely missed. Our other perimeter players must step up big time.
- Memphis likes to slow down to almost a halt. We must generate turn overs, and get fast break pts, in order to neutralize their slow pace.
1st half- 13:50, Up 12-6. Good offensive start, 5-8 FG, including 2 from downtown.
- 7:49, Up 17-15. We led by as many as 9, but our shooting has gone cold lately.
- Halftime, Up 27-24. Both teams shot below 40% FG. MEM's interior defense is very tight, as our starting bigs (PF Syrone Franklin and C David Irvin) combined to shoot only 5-15 FG. On the other hand, we have limited MEM's outside shooting to 1-6 3PT.
2nd half- 14:34, Down 33-34. MEM beginning to hit their outside shots. We're going exclusively m2m defense.
- 11:37, Up 39-36. We managed a couple of inside baskets. Our foul situation is a concern though; we have 5 team fouls already.
- 7:38, Up 44-43. MEM's full court press starting to pressure our guards, as we have committed turn overs in our own back court. We're in the penalty.
- 3:34, Down 47-55. MEM's defense has shown its muscle. We will shift to heavy outside focus.
We made 2 successive defensive stops, and able to score on our end.
Down 51-55, 2:18.
MEM missed, but we got called for a foul. MEM hits both FTs. Down 6. PF Shyrone Franklin hits a short-range jumper. Down 4. A drive by MEM resulting in another foul. MEM canned both FTs. Timeout.
Down 53-59, 1:35.
There is plenty of time, as I told the players. C David Irvin missed. MEM with the ball. MEM missed also. Timeout.
Down 53-59, 0:48.
We need to go for 3s. But we turned the ball over. We have no choice but to give up fouls. MEM getting their FTs to fall. We hit a couple of 3s, but still down by 5 with only 0:12 left. Not gonna do it.
We were able to hang on in the 1st half. But the pace, and the low-scoring game, were clearly the way MEM have planned. Our fouls, and shortened bench, wasn't enough in the end.
Final Score: Sacramento St - 59, Memphis - 66
Box Scores
[INDENT]Irvin 16, 7, 0
Franklin 13, 8, 0
Hemsley 9, 2, 5, 7 tos, fouled out
McIntosh 6, 2, 8, 5 stls
Williams 5, 4, 1
Richerson 5, 3, 0
Reid 3, 1, 0
Celuck 2, 0, 2
Osbourne 0, 3, 0
[/INDENT]
Stats Comparison
[INDENT]FG: 42-47%
REB: -2
TO: -2
Pts in paint: +14
2nd chance: -5
Fast break: +2
[/INDENT]